Why Managers Need to Take Responsibility for Their Development
It is (or it should be) a given that managers and supervisors should be directly responsible for the training employees receive in their department.
And there is a good reason for that.
To excel one must evolve
Who is responsible for the manager’s development?
An Evolving Team Excels
An evolving team, learning new skills regularly, is a team that will excel. Your team development could be in health and safety or bullying and harassment in the workplace. Perhaps you introduced a new CRM software system where they could excel if they had more knowledge. Each profession has emerging trends and skillsets, and as people expand their knowledge and awareness, their confidence builds, and the team as a whole does better.
My guess: that the team performs at an optimal level.
Effective managers do not neglect the training needs of staff
They know (all too well) the importance of motivating employees to grow as professionals.
Teams Excel and The Organization Excels
Not only does it make for happier employees, but the bonus result is also that organizations reap an equal amount of the benefits.
When a manager is fully engaged in challenging and motivating their team to grow their knowledge base through training and development, that team is more often than not a top-notch group of performers.
They are also confident that management has its back.
Managers Development
It’s not a coincidence that the best-trained staff has the best managers. But what about the managers themselves? A managers development is critical to their personal and professional success.
If you are a manager, are you taking the time and responsibility to ensure you are receiving ongoing training to develop your skills?
Are you at the top of your game? Leaders must take responsibility for their own learning and development.
Whether it be taking online courses, attending workshops, or bringing in coaches for focused training—it is all essential.
Stagnation Can Be Contagious
Leaders should strive to grow on both a professional and personal level continually.
Failure to do so results in a kind of managerial stagnation.
And worse, a complacent staff.
Below are only a few examples of the many benefits professional development brings to leaders, their team, and organizations as a whole.
Managing Change
All companies and organizations will experience change.
It is, after all, the only constant.
Change is an opportunity to grow and evolve.
There is a wealth of potential for much good to emerge from change.
Managers, however, need to develop their ability to control and guide the unexpected effectively.
Chances are what you learned 20 years ago in university might not have fully equipped you with the right tools to manage the change occurring in the present.
Accept your ignorance on some things, and fill that void with the right kind of knowledge.
Refine Team-Building Skills
Knowing how to create robust, resilient teams is usually not a natural ability from birth.
Managers need to take part in hands-on, focused activities that equip them with the tools to help nurture and motivate employees.
Running a department while simultaneously being able and bring out the best qualities in individuals is no walk in the park.
Honing and improving your ability to inspire an entire team to keep their eyes on the bottom line is a skill you need to be regularly refining, if not reassessing.
Adapt to Diverse Approaches
We are all individuals with unique angles and approaches to facing challenges and solving difficult problems.
Successful managers can appreciate and empathize with the different approaches staff have to think about challenging problems.
An inability to embrace different approaches to resolve the same problem is a recipe for mediocrity, if not disaster.
Managers need to learn to adapt their thinking and change how they tackle different problems.
New challenges require new thinking.
A leader needs to be regularly learning new ways to tackle problems, old and new.
Improve Meeting Performance
Knowing how to lead a meeting effectively is a skill all managers should have as close to an expert handle on as possible.
Unfortunately, this is a skill that leaders often fail to master.
Worse, it’s a skill many managers do not have.
Workshops focusing on improving meeting efficiency and effectiveness can do wonders to develop a manager’s ability to rein in unfocused staff meetings.
You know, those meetings that have broken up into cliques.
Or where everyone seems lost in the woods.
Improve Workflow
An efficient approach to workflow is something many organizations face challenges in achieving.
Although this can be beyond a manager’s control, you, the manger, bear ultimate responsibility.
There is a wealth of leadership courses dedicated to improving workflow in dynamic ways that produce lasting results.
Sometimes these fixes require a tectonic shift in the daily operation of things.
But, most often minor tweaks in basic procedures can result in significant improvements.
Objective, third-party advice can go a long way to opening a manager’s eyes in improving inefficiencies in workflow.
Learn to be Creative
Managers need to nurture creative approaches to tackling challenging problems.
Without a culture of creativity, organizations wane of vital energy. They lack versatile approaches to unique challenges now or in the future.
Managers can enroll in workshops that specifically focus on ways to nurture and improve creativity through hands-on scenarios and activities.
Get ready for a wonderful shift in company culture.
Managers who develop their ability to problem solve and troubleshoot in ways that are “outside-the-box” equip themselves with a more expansive set of tools to tackle unexpected challenges.
Access to Experienced Leaders
Finally, one-on-one leadership coaching provides valuable access to experienced mentors.
You know, those who have been there and have done that!
Often leadership coaches will have acquired hard-earned insight throughout their careers.
This incredibly valuable and personal approach to leadership development gives you a front-row seat to tried and true methods for improving your leadership skills.
These seven examples are, but a handful of the many benefits leaders stand to gain—not to mention the overall success of their organizations—by committing themselves to be regular professional (and personal) development.
What are you waiting for?
Stay tuned as we are launching our on-line Leadership Accelerator Program later on this spring…you will definitely receive notifications as we fix the launch date with special early-bird pricing available until that launch date…
Plus, we already provide one-on-one coaching here at Fiore Group Training!
